


Keep Breathing

by Tsuminoaru



Series: Car Repair Shop 'Verse [1]
Category: Supernatural, Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Angst, Closeted Character, Crossover, Drabbles, Fanart, Friendship, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Insecurity, Language, M/M, Mechanic Dean, Mechanic Derek, POV Alternating, Romance, Sketches, Slice of Life, boys having issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-11-09
Updated: 2013-11-10
Packaged: 2017-12-31 23:54:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1037888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tsuminoaru/pseuds/Tsuminoaru
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SPN + TeenWolf CarRepairShop!AU where Dean and Derek work at the same garage and are frenemies. Though, after almost a year or so knowing each other, are probably pretty good friends at this point. Also, where their issues have issues and their lifes are horrible but things are starting to look up even though it doesn’t look like it at the first glance. Where Cas shows up looking for Dean possiably wanting to make amends and a teenage kid with a not so secret crush on Derek keeps showing up at the repair shop. This is pretty much a case of a blind leading a blind. Dean/Cas, Derek/Stiles</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello there! Besically I've been obsessed with this AU idea for a long time, I wanted a scenario where Dean and Derek are friends; where they have each other's back because there is silent understandment of the other party due to own experience.  
> And now I couldn't keep it to myself anymore and had to throw it out there.  
> This is going to be a series of drabbles about them (with occasional doodles) Also, I'm looking for a beta (please contact me if you are willing to help me out or know someone who would). English isn't my fist language so I hope this is not too terrible OTL

 

"So, what are you going to do about the Sheriff’s kid?" asked Dean from where he was still half sunken into the front of an old Audi behind the hood, not looking up.

Derek paused, the water bottle held inches from his mouth as he was about to take a sip.

Irritated, his first impulse was to throw back ‘what are  _you_  going to do about your platonic love of your life showing up in town after a year of silence?’. Because if they were having a sharing and caring moment, he wasn’t the one with the pressing issues.

But contrary to the general opinion, he wasn’t a complete asshole.   
He knew what it was like to be in a state where everything around you was crumbling to pieces and you were just barely keeping your head above the water while life just kept kicking you where it hurt most. The only reason he wasn’t there himself was because everything around him had turned to ashes a long time ago, and after Laura and Peter nothing could possibly hurt because everything was numb anyway. But Dean still had something to lose, he was still treading water, and Derek wasn’t sure whether to pity or envy him. The man would probably sink. From what Derek knew about life and how it went for people like them, it was the most likely outcome. Still, there was the possibility that Dean would reach a coast, or a safe boat would finally find him and drag him out of the deep water. And no matter how bitter Derek was, he wished for the latter to happen.

Leveling the bottle to his lips Derek took a long sip, leaning further back against the Jeep he was currently working on.  _Again_.

  
“Fuck if I knew,” he growled out in the end.


	2. Chapter 2

“Hi! Is Derek there? My Jeep started making these weird rattling noises and, you know, I’ve been here three times in less than a month already. There is only so much money I can spend on repair. What’s with me still being in High School and all. So I thought - hey, you guys seem pretty friendly with your customers and Derek probably knows Betty better than I do at this point. Maybe he would share some insight out of the goodness of his heart? Pro bono. Or like a small service free of charge for a regular like me. Hey, why don’t you get these cards, like in the coffee shops - pay five get one for free or something? I bet it would pay off.”

Dean snorted and took another bite of his sandwich while the kid kept babbling at the speed of a Ferrari, chewing Amy’s ear off. He could see him gesticulating wildly with his hands through the half open door to the office. Expression going from nervous to fake exasperated, to annoyed, to hopeful. He felt almost sympathetic for her. Almost.  
She totally threw him under the bus last week as Gerry asked who ate his last doughnut so Dean wasn’t in a hurry to rescue her. But then she glanced over Stiles’ shoulder to the door, probably thinking about a possible escape, and caught him standing there.

Sonofabitch!

“Oh, Dean, what a great timing. Mr. Stilinski here is looking for Derek - I’m sure you can help find him. Why don’t you?” Amy said sweetly.

Before Dean even could so much as send her a _why are you doing this to me?_ glance or promise revenge, Stiles was turning around, arms flailing. He beamed at Dean and plunged back into his excited babble.

 

It wasn’t that he didn’t like the kid. He was smart and witty, terrifyingly good at pushing other people's buttons and full of unchanneled energy. Plus, it was freaking hilarious to watch Derek fencing off Stiles’ not so subtle advances. At least in the beginning.

For all that Stiles let his car for repair ‘only’ three times he’d been coming here at least two times a week, under the pretense of checking on the progress on his car or needing replacement parts for his dad’s car or a friend’s car or _something_. He would start with car related questions and slowly drift off topic, Derek would grunt and roll his eyes and reply in monosyllabic sentences, sometimes looking incredulous at Stiles depending on what yet again failed to filter on the way from brain to mouth.

The thing was - Stiles was persistent and Derek started to loosen up around the kid. His posture wasn’t quite so tense, his annoyed eyeroll more fond exasperated than really irritated like it used to be. Stiles would stand closer than it was strictly necessary to the other man, and Derek would let him.

That the development bothered Dean was fairly clear. As much as he knew better than anyone that Derek could use something good in his life - the guy was fucking lonely, Dean knew because he wasn’t better off himself, and confiding in each other made them less alone but no less lonely - this just couldn’t go anywhere and therefor bound to end in a disaster.

So, for all that Dean laughed and snorted in amusement at their interaction, he couldn’t stop becoming more wary of them.

Beacon Hills was a small town and gossip traveled fast. It was fun and game as long as people spoke about an innocent teenage crush, unrequired, and the Sheriff threatened Derek jokingly when they run into each other in the supermarkt. But how long would it take until people started noticing there was maybe more to it than that?

Quite frankly, Dean wondered whether Stiles noticed; whether he knew what he was doing. He was pretty sure Stiles did. The kid wasn’t as clueless and he let people believe. And then Dean wondered what the fuck kind of friend he was that he didn’t intervene and watched this trainwreck instead. But in the end, what could he possibly do other than tell Derek what a freaktastic bad idea it was? They were 6 years apart, for fuck's sake. And even though Dean wasn't sure there was actual attraction on Derek's part, there was no question whatsoever what Stiles' thoughs in regards to Derek were. Unintentionally or not, he was leading this kid on. And Dean did that - the telling, the warning. With increasing frequency. Only that Derek knew damn well himself he shouldn't fuck around and indulge. And to be honest Dean was afraid that if he pressed the matter too hard, Derek would turn the conversation to him instead. Address the fucking elephant in the room and Dean wasn’t ready so much as to think about Cas being back, being here in this blib of a town _because of Dean,_ not to mention talk about him, or even hear someone’s opinion on the matter.

 

Dean gulped the rest of his sandwich down and motioned with a hand for the teenager to follow.

“Come on kid. His break is almost over,” he said with a grin and turned to lead the way while Stiles started complaining how everyone called him kid here.

 

Dean was a fucking coward.

 


	3. Chapter 3

“You can’t avoid him forever,” said Derek, shucking off his coverall and stepping out of it.

There was no reply from Dean.   
Derek glanced over to where the man had stopped fiddling with the cup of his water bottle. He was sitting on the bench opposite the lockers; his posture tense, lips thinning into a hard line.

Derek rolled his eyes in annoyance and took out his jeans, pulled them on and slid back into his boots.

There was only so much sympathy he could bring of. It had been almost two weeks since this Castiel fellow showed up at their garage asking for Dean which didn’t lead anywhere. Really. Since Dean had walked out on the guy before he even could finish one sentence.

 

Derek knew the bones of the story, pretty much like Dean knew the bones of Derek’s history - the Fire, Kate, what went down with Peter and how he lost Laura. But they were well versed in reading between the lines, knew what to look for when the words stopped and the bottom of the bottle was barely covered with amber liquid.

It had been startling and bizarre when they had started trading memories, that one time in the bar now almost a year ago, and finding so many similarities. He remembered thinking almost hysterically how the fuck he happened to meet this guy who was an asshole, only actually not so much; whose mother died in a house fire like Derek’s, together with eleven other family members; whose father couldn’t overcome the grief, spiraling further out of reality like Derek’s uncle, the only remaining adult surviving the fire; whose family was reduced to one sibling who was lost to him, off chasing the dream, even though not dead like Derek’s sister. Plus, partner betrayal, sort of. Though after Castiel showed up, Derek had learned a bit more about their ‘friendship’ and the fallout. Frankly, he was certain they’d both silently agreed that nothing could possibly top Kate.

In any case - Dean and Derek? They were fucking meant to be.

But Kate had been fucking _crazy_ while this Castiel guy might have been wrong in his actions but he didn’t seem intentionally cruel, or _insane_ for that matter. For all that Derek sympathized with Dean he didn’t think the guy was so innocent in the clusterfuck he’d found himself in. Derek understood that he was trying; that he was keeping himself and his life together as good as he could. He understood _emotional baggage_. He understood guilt. But, Dean’s issues - no matter how big - were _fixable_. If he just stopped being in so much denial.

 

“This is bullshit. And you know it. He is fucking sorry - why else would he be here looking like a kicked puppy? And you actually want to forgive him. I know it, you know it, _and he probably knows it too_. Pull your head out of your ass and go talk to him so that your epic bromance can flourish once again.”

He picked off his coverall and stuffed it into his locker.

The bottle missed Derek’s head only by an inch or two, bounced off of the metal behind him and tumbled heavy to the ground.

“What the fuck!?” Derek exclaimed, turning and staring at Dean in disbelieve. That just took the icing.

“It’s not that fucking easy,” came the angry response, paired with a glare.

Derek just glared back.

“It fucking _is_ ,” he said insistent, slammed the locker door shut and left the changing room.

 

If Derek had ever met a man so fucking deep in the closet he was in the fucking _Narnia_ then it was Dean Winchester. Derek was convinced that it was the root of his problems with Castiel - then, and now, and in the future. How someone could be so much in denial was beyond Derek. But try telling Dean he was maybe a bit gay for his former best friend or whatever the fuck they were.

 

And he’d first thought Dean’s issues were bigger than his. Not that it was a competition. Still, Derek could laugh. He was falling in love with a _minor_ , who on top of that was the only son of the _Sheriff_! Not to mention there was no chance whatsoever that Stiles was actually interested in anything beyond sex. Probably the kid didn’t even think so far, what’s with being only _seventeen_ , and actually aimed for makeout sessions in order to gain some experience for when he got an actual girlfriend or boyfriend. Someone his age; someone without so many corpses in the closet; someone with an actual future, unlike Derek.  
It wouldn't all be so bad if Derek wasn't slowly comming to the realization that if this went on, he soon would lose the ability to deny Stiles anything. And the kid kept _pushing._

It was _terrifying_.

  
Now, _these_ were problems!


End file.
